Carrot Snack Cake

Zutaten

Cake

1 cup golden raisins

¼ cup orange juice

2½ cups (12½ ounces) all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

¾ teaspoon table salt

1½ cups packed (10½ ounces) light brown sugar

1¼ cups vegetable oil

4 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 pound carrots, peeled and shredded (3 cups)

1 cup (4 ounces) confectioners’ sugar

⅔ cup buttermilk

Frosting

12 ounces cream cheese, softened

2 cups (8 ounces) confectioners’ sugar

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

⅛ teaspoon table salt

1 cup pecans, toasted and chopped

Anweisungen

1. For the Cake Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Spray 13 by 9-inch baking pan with vegetable oil spray. Combine raisins and orange juice in small bowl. Microwave, covered, until hot, about 1 minute. Let stand, covered, until raisins are soft, about 5 minutes.

2. Whisk flour, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in medium bowl; set aside. Whisk brown sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla in large bowl until smooth; stir in carrots and raisin mixture. Stir in flour mixture with rubber spatula until just combined.

3. Transfer batter to prepared pan and smooth top with rubber spatula. Bake until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean, 33 to 38 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking. Transfer pan to wire rack.

4. Immediately whisk confectioners’ sugar and buttermilk together until smooth. Brush buttermilk syrup evenly over entire surface of hot cake (use all of syrup). Let cake cool completely in pan on wire rack, about 3 hours.

5. For the Frosting Process cream cheese, sugar, butter, vanilla, and salt in food processor until smooth, about 30 seconds, scraping down sides of bowl with rubber spatula as needed.

6. Spread frosting evenly over surface of cake, leaving ½-inch border. Sprinkle frosting evenly with pecans. Serve.

To Make Ahead Frosted cake can be covered with plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 2 days.

Notizen

Shred the carrots in a food processor fitted with the shredding disk or on the large holes of a box grater. One pound of carrots is about six medium carrots and will yield about 12 ounces of shredded carrots after peeling and trimming.

Carrot-Ginger Snack Cake with Cardamom

Substitute 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon and 1 teaspoon ground cardamom for pumpkin pie spice. Stir in 1½ tablespoons grated fresh ginger with carrots and raisin mixture in step 2. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons finely chopped crystallized ginger over top of frosted cake with pecans in step 6.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS We wanted an incredibly tasty carrot cake that was easier, faster, and more moist than ever. To that end, we skipped the stacking of layers and fiddling with piping bags and opted to make an easy-to-prepare sheet cake in a 13 by 9-inch baking pan. Shredding the carrots and making the cream cheese frosting in a food processor made quick work of these otherwise tedious steps. A couple of easy but uncommon techniques ensured an ultramoist and superflavorful cake. First, we plumped and softened golden raisins in orange juice before stirring them into the batter. Then, we soaked the still-hot, just-baked cake in a stir-together buttermilk syrup, moistening the cake and balancing its sweetness while enhancing the tanginess of the cream cheese frosting.